


We Learn

by ReoPlusOne



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, Family Drama, Family Feels, Family Issues, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-02-25
Packaged: 2018-05-23 02:39:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6102095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReoPlusOne/pseuds/ReoPlusOne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>America and Canada have a lot to learn.  But slowly, they are learning after all.  Gen, past implied FrUK.  Genderbent France and genderbent Canada.  America's part -- chapter 1.  Canada's part -- chapter 2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. America

_"Un-deux-trois, un-deux-trois, un-deux-trois..."_

Alfred's first memory is of that sound. His parents had 'never gotten along', his father had told him, and they hadn't for centuries. So though he was daily under the care of his father there were times when his mother was allowed into his life. And the moment he could walk, she insisted that he also learn how to dance.

The room was filled with nothing but French, a language he'd never heard before, and the sounds of his own feet as he toddles side to side and clutches her hands for dear life. The unfamiliar words were the bit that stuck with him the most. Were they a chant? A nighttime prayer to dance to? Did his father, in all his wisdom, understand them? His sister spent her days then with their mother alone, only sometimes allowed to see England. She was fast asleep in her chair, feet twitching to the rhythm her mother hummed.

She probably already completed all of her dancing lessons.

And when little America grew tired and his face scrunched up in a frown, his mother drops to her knees and dirties her beautiful gown to whisper more French in his ear. And he didn't understand it really, but he knew it meant she loved him and he crawled up into her arms and falls fast asleep.

It would be a long time then before he completed his lessons as his sister had, and by that time Madeline would be the property of his father England -- and he himself would be on the path to freedom. It was evening again, and he was just as tired as he was then; his feet ached from marching and shooting, his head throbbed from listening to orders all day. Conceiving a revolution was the easiest thing he'd ever done, but now that he was actually there? It took all he had just to keep going. He said this to her, irritated and pulling on his nightclothes, and she simply laughed over her shoulder. "It is the same with all things," She said with a shrug, "But most of all with children."

That seemed to put both their minds back in the same place, and within a moment she was ushering him to his (bare) feet and dragging him to the biggest space in his small tent for a dance. He was taller than she was, but worst of all, now that he was no longer prepubescent he was expected to lead.

And though she was his mother and much much smaller than him, there was something irrevocably intimidating about her. 

Every man in camp desired her, all his officers could hardly stop staring at her long enough to give a respectful bow when she arrived, and he knew this. And he, as an adult (who grew up hardly knowing her) knew he should probably feel the same. But the part of him that longed for the warm affection of an absent mother was still there, and he found himself only longing for her as she was; a mother. So, the rebel boy that had destroyed his father's precious cargo and declared himself independent from all who would govern him unjustly just months before quietly listened and obeyed without question.

From the day he was made Alfred was a fast learner. The spins, the steps, the position of his hands came to him within instants of being told, and soon he really was leading the way -- stepping in time with an orchestra that was not there, meeting the gazes of proud onlookers that did not exist. As the crescendo of their silent symphony came and went they both stood there shimmering with the sheen of sweat. He put his head on her shoulder and rested it there, all the weight of the world falling from his shoulders for just a moment. "Do you ever find that you miss..." He murmured against the lace of her collar, "That you miss people? Even though --"

"Even though I know I shouldn't," She finishes, ever gracious, ever insisting on the most carefully chosen words, "I do."

He slept just a little better that night, knowing that perhaps being imperfect didn't mean he was still a child.


	2. Canada

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> My advice? Read this chapter to the song "Dearly Beloved" from the Kingdom Hearts soundtrack.

As her brother across the border learned a lesson in independence and being on his own, Madeline had to learn something new herself.

She had come partially into Arthur's possession long ago, but the last seizure of her land was painful enough that she would always remember it. She'd grown up in a house full of ladies, doting, high-pitched and always murmuring to one another their gossip about what men were like behind closed doors. And did they talk about ladies as much as ladies talked about them? And were they as polite around one another as they were around them?

One night her mother came to her and held her tightly, apologizing again and again, whispering all kinds of terrified nothings into her ear of how it wasn't her decision, how her monarch had wished it and it wasn't her, and to please forgive her. And just before sunrise, four British officers came to the door to take Madeline away.

When she saw a grand house on a hill flying the British flag in the distance and realized it was her father's house, she thought that perhaps she could answer some of her friends' questions. But it was only after living with her brother and father for so long that she realized that it was both boring and terrifying. Though England had been nothing short of cordial when she was allowed to see him as a child, now that she was a lady (and living in his home) he was totally ignorant of the fact that she was there. His focus at first was entirely on his son, precious boy, and when that relationship began to sour -- on his affairs in Europe.

And then in an instant Alfred was gone. One day she awoke and got dressed, and found no one in the kitchen but a few wide-eyed slaves mumbling about their master being furious. Just judging from what she'd heard out of them she expected an enraged hellion bursting through the front door, but the unbelievable truth was that he entered as quietly as his son had left, staring into a cup of tea like it was staring back at him.

And so while Alfred was down south getting one more dancing lesson, Madeline took a class in how to suffer.

Arthur started by writing letters. Hundreds of letters, all to Alfred under the new surname he'd taken for himself: Jones. And when she'd quietly asked if she could perhaps give herself a new last name too (Madeline Kirkland just didn't sound right) he just looked at her, looked like she was a cup of tea sending his reflection to stare right back at him. And she never spoke of it again. Suffering was something Arthur had learned a _lot_ about, she found. Because there was no one else to talk to in the house, she sat politely and listened to every story he had to tell. The more stories he told, the worse she felt for him.

"The point of a siege, you see," Arthur started like a man twice his physical age, "Is to choke out your enemy. Force them into a surrender by waiting for their resources to dry up."

Talking of such things must have been so easy for him and Alfred, Madeline considered for a moment. But she had not studied military strategy nor military history, only being able to quietly agree, "Like a wolf waiting for something in a tree?"

He continued as if she was not there. Perhaps, Madeline wondered, she really wasn't and he was simply a lunatic living alone, rambling on about siege. "The siege at Yorktown went... poorly, you see. It isn't always easy to be on the other side."

As a child Madeline knew misery as something that didn't stay long. It only lasted as long as a a breeze could carry a black bee to sting her in the summertime, but Arthur? Arthur made misery into a way of life, something that hung onto him like a black cloak he could never take off. It was something he inflicted on others (the simultaneous biggest victim and biggest cause of his misery of course being her mother) in retaliation. Slowly, surely, it got worse.

Madeline learned never to cry in front of others, and if you felt the need to a good pinch on the bridge of your nose could stop it right quick. She learned that the one and only time you could say what you felt was at prayer time before bed, when no one could hear you but God (or so Arthur thought, the walls were thin and she was sure he could hear her crying for her mother as much as she heard him crying for his son).

She learned that no matter how many times you cry and say you'll do anything to get the person you love back, God will never relent.

She learned that in the end, the best way to lessen your suffering is to will yourself to let it go, and she learned this best because Arthur never did. Every sight of Alfred, every thought of him left him mourning again -- just a little. And he kept on with his daily life, like she had learned to go on with hers minus Marianne, and together they found a little bit of comfort. She slept where Alfred used to before he outgrew the space in Arthur's bed, though he could never hold her too close lest he touch her breasts, and Arthur whispered her lullabies like her mother used to, though they'd never be in French. Through the heartbreak they'd forged their friendship in, they carried on.

But it would never be the same.


End file.
